Driving method and device for GOA circuit, and display device

ABSTRACT

A driving method and device for a GOA circuit, and a display device. The driving method includes: reducing a clock signal frequency of the GOA circuit to 1/M of an original clock signal frequency, in a case where data signals of one frame of image satisfy a frequency reduction condition. The frequency reduction condition includes that the data signals of the one frame of image is capable of being equally divided into M parts in time sequence, data signals of each of the M parts are the same, and M is an integer and M≥2.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application is the National Stage of PCT/CN2019/088151 filed on May23, 2019, which claims priority under 35 U.S.C. § 119 of ChineseApplication No. 201810522096.6 filed on May 28, 2018, the disclosure ofwhich is incorporated by reference.

TECHNICAL FIELD

Embodiments of the present disclosure relate to a driving method and adriving device for a GOA circuit and a display device.

BACKGROUND

In recent years, GOA (Gate Driver on Array) technology has been widelyused in LCDs (Liquid Crystal Displays). That is, a gate switchingcircuit of a TFT (Thin Film Transistor) is integrated in a non-displayarea of a LCD to form a GOA circuit, thereby achieving a narrow bezeldesign.

SUMMARY

At least one embodiment of the present disclosure provides a drivingmethod for a gate driver on array (GOA) circuit, the driving methodincluding:

reducing a clock signal frequency of the GOA circuit to 1/M of anoriginal clock signal frequency, in a case where data signals of oneframe of image satisfy a frequency reduction condition,

wherein the frequency reduction condition comprises that the datasignals of the one frame of image is capable of being equally dividedinto M parts in time sequence, data signals of each of the M parts arethe same, and M is an integer and M≥2.

Optionally, the driving method according to at least one embodiment ofthe present disclosure further includes: maintaining a refresh frequencyof the GOA circuit unchanged in a case where the data signals of the oneframe of image satisfy the frequency reduction condition.

Optionally, the driving method according to at least one embodiment ofthe present disclosure further includes: maintaining a refresh frequencyof the GOA circuit unchanged and controlling the clock signal frequencyof the GOA circuit to be the original clock signal frequency, in a casewhere the data signals of the one frame of image do not satisfy thefrequency reduction condition.

Optionally, the reducing the clock signal frequency of the GOA circuitto 1/M of the original clock signal frequency, in a case where the datasignals of the one frame of image satisfy the frequency reductioncondition, includes:

reducing the clock signal frequency of the GOA circuit to ½ of theoriginal clock signal frequency, in a case where the data signals of theone frame of image satisfy a condition that data signals of a first halfframe of image are the same as data signals of a second half frame ofimage.

Optionally, the driving method according to at least one embodiment ofthe present disclosure further includes further includes: controllingblank time between adjacent frames of images to be zero.

At least one embodiment of the present disclosure further provides adriving device for a gate driver on array (GOA) circuit, which includesa control sub-circuit configured to reduce a clock signal frequency ofthe GOA circuit to 1/M of an original clock signal frequency in a casewhere data signals of one frame of image satisfy a frequency reductioncondition,

wherein the frequency reduction condition comprises that the datasignals of the one frame of image is capable of being equally dividedinto M parts in time sequence, data signals of each of the M parts arethe same, and M is an integer and M≥2.

Optionally, in the driving device according to at least one embodimentof the present disclosure, the control sub-circuit is further configuredto maintain a refresh frequency of the GOA circuit unchanged in a casewhere the data signals of the one frame of image satisfy the frequencyreduction condition.

Optionally, in the driving device according to at least one embodimentof the present disclosure, the control sub-circuit is further configuredto, in a case where the data signals of the one frame of image do notsatisfy the frequency reduction condition, maintain the refreshfrequency of the GOA circuit unchanged and control the clock signalfrequency of the GOA circuit to be the original clock signal frequency.

Optionally, in the driving device according to at least one embodimentof the present disclosure, the control sub-circuit is further configuredto: reduce the clock signal frequency of the GOA circuit to ½ of theoriginal clock signal frequency, in a case where the data signals of theone frame of image satisfy a condition that data signals of a first halfframe of image are the same as data signals of a second half frame ofimage.

Optionally, in the driving device according to at least one embodimentof the present disclosure, the control sub-circuit is further configuredto control blank time between adjacent frames of images to be zero.

Optionally, the driving device according to at least one embodiment ofthe present disclosure further includes a determining sub-circuit insignal connection with the control sub-circuit signal, wherein thedetermining sub-circuit is configured to determine whether the datasignals of the one frame of image satisfy the frequency reductioncondition and output a determination result to the control sub-circuit.

At least one embodiment of the present disclosure further provides adisplay device, which includes any above-mentioned driving device forthe GOA circuit.

At least one embodiment of the present disclosure further provides adriving method for a gate driver on array (GOA) circuit, which includes:

providing data signals of a first frame of image and reducing a clocksignal frequency of the GOA circuit to a 1/M of an original clock signalfrequency, wherein data signals of the first frame of image is capableof being equally divided into M parts in time sequence, data signals ofeach of the M parts are the same, and M is an integer and M≥2.

For example, the driving method according to at least one embodiment ofthe present disclosure further includes: maintaining a refresh frequencyof the GOA circuit unchanged.

For example, the driving method according to at least one embodiment ofthe present disclosure further includes:

providing data signals of a second frame of image, maintaining therefresh frequency of the GOA circuit unchanged and controlling the clocksignal frequency of the GOA circuit to be the original clock signalfrequency, wherein the data signals of the second frame of image is notcapable of being equally divided into M parts in time sequence.

For example, in the driving method according to at least one embodimentof the present disclosure, M=2.

For example, the driving method according to at least one embodiment ofthe present disclosure further includes: controlling blank time betweenadjacent frames of images to be zero.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

In order to clearly illustrate the technical solution of the embodimentsof the present disclosure, the drawings of the embodiments will bebriefly described in the following; it is obvious that the describeddrawings are only related to some embodiments of the present disclosureand thus are not limitative of the present disclosure.

FIG. 1 is a timing diagram of driving a GOA circuit;

FIG. 2 is a schematic circuit structure diagram of an exemplary GOAunit;

FIG. 3 is a schematic circuit structure diagram of an exemplary GOAcircuit;

FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram of a comparison of scanning directions ofa grate line respectively when a frequency reduction condition issatisfied and when being driven normally;

FIG. 5 is a timing diagram of driving a GOA circuit according to atleast one embodiment of the present disclosure;

FIG. 6 is a schematic block diagram of a driving device for a GOAcircuit according to at least one embodiment of the present disclosure;and

FIG. 7 is a schematic block diagram of a display device according to atleast one embodiment of the present disclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

In order to make objects, technical details and advantages of theembodiments of the present disclosure apparent, the technical solutionsof the embodiments will be described in a clearly and fullyunderstandable way in connection with the drawings related to theembodiments of the present disclosure. Apparently, the describedembodiments are just a part but not all of the embodiments of thepresent disclosure. Based on the described embodiments herein, thoseskilled in the art can obtain other embodiment(s), without any inventivework, which should be within the scope of the present disclosure.

As an example for illustration, an LCD includes 2000 cascaded GOA units,has a refresh frequency of 60 Hz, and 8 CLK signals in one clock cycle.As shown in FIG. 1, scan time for one frame of image is 1/60 s, and theabove 2000 rows of gate lines all are scanned once in the scan time foreach frame of image. Therefore, in order to drive the GOA circuit tooperate, an IC (Integrated Circuit) outputs clock signals for 250 times,each of which is composed of 8 CLK signals. That is, the IC outputs 8CLK signals of a high frequency without interruption, which will reducethe life of the IC.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a driving method for aGOA circuit, including: in a case where data signals of one frame ofimage (for example, source signals input to a data line connected to asource electrode of a driving transistor in a display panel) satisfy afrequency reduction condition, reducing the clock signal frequency ofthe GOA circuit to 1/M of an original clock signal frequency. Thefrequency reduction condition includes that: data signals of one frameof image can be equally divided into M parts in time sequence, and thedata signals of each part are the same, where M is an integer and M≥2.Herein, the original clock signal frequency may refer to a clock signalfrequency preset for the GOA circuit. It should be noted that, first,for the GOA circuit, i.e., the gate driving circuit composed of aplurality of cascaded GOA units, a gate scanning signal output by eachstage of GOA unit can control turning on each row of gate line; and whena gate line corresponding to a row of pixels is turned on, a data signalcan be input to the row of pixels through a data line corresponding tothe pixel, thereby driving the row of pixels to perform a displayoperation. As known to those skilled in the art, a display image of thedisplay panel is generally controlled by data signals of each frame ofimage. Those skilled in the art can understand that in a case where datasignals of one frame of image satisfy the frequency reduction condition,i.e., the condition that data signals of one frame of image can beequally divided into M parts in time sequence, and the data signals ofeach part are the same, in this case, taking M=2 as an example, when thedisplay panel displays an image at this time, the upper half screen andthe lower half screen display the same picture.

Second, the refresh frequency of the GOA circuit refers to a number oftimes an image is refreshed per second. In the embodiments of thepresent disclosure, in a case where data signals of one frame of imagesatisfy the frequency reduction condition, the refresh frequency of theGOA circuit does not change, that is, the frequency of the start signalSTV of each frame of image does not change. Generally, the clock signalis used as an output signal of the GOA circuit, that is, output as agate scan signal to each row of gate line. Therefore, the frequency ofthe clock signal determines the turning on duration of each row of gateline of the display panel, that is, the charging time of each row ofpixels.

FIG. 2 is a circuit structure diagram of an exemplary GOA unit. Forexample, the GOA unit is an n-th stage of the GOA circuit. As shown inFIG. 2, the GOA unit 210 includes a first transistor T1, a secondtransistor T2, a third transistor T3, a fourth transistor T4, and astorage capacitor C1.

The first transistor T1 in the GOA unit 210 is an output transistor at asignal output terminal of the GOA unit 210. For example, the firsttransistor T1 has a first electrode connected to a clock signal CLK, anda second electrode connected to a first electrode of the secondtransistor T2 to form the output terminal of the GOA unit 210, and toallow outputting a gate scan signal Gn for the n-th row of pixel units(the signal is a square wave pulse signal, the pulse part has aturning-on level and the non-pulse part has a turning-off level) as aninput signal for the next stage GOA unit 210. The first transistor T1has a gate electrode connected to a first node PU, thus connecting afirst electrode of the third transistor T3 and a second electrode of thefourth transistor T4.

The second transistor T2 has a second electrode connected to a secondelectrode of the third transistor T3 and a low-level signal VGL. Thesecond transistor T2 has a gate electrode connected to the gateelectrode of the third transistor T3 and an output terminal of the GOAunit 210 of the next row (that is, the (n+1)th row), to receive a gatescan signal G(n+1) as an output pull-down control signal. The firstelectrode of the second transistor T2 is connected to the secondelectrode of the first transistor T1, so the second transistor T2 can beturned on under the control of the output pull-down control signal, topull down the output signal at the output terminal to a low-level signalVGL without outputting a gate scan signal Gn.

The third transistor T3 has a first electrode which is also connected tothe first node PU and thus is electrically connected to the secondelectrode of the fourth transistor T4 and the gate electrode of thefirst transistor T1. A second electrode of the third transistor T3 isconnected to the low-level signal VGL, and a gate electrode of the thirdtransistor T3 is also connected to the output terminal of the GOA unit210 of the next row (that is, the (n+1)th row), to receive the gate scansignal G(n+1) as the reset control signal (which is also the outputpull-down control signal), so that the third transistor T3 can be turnedon under the control of the reset control signal to reset the first nodePU to the low-level signal VGL, thereby turning off the first transistorT1.

The fourth transistor T4 has a first electrode connected to a gateelectrode of the fourth transistor T4 and to an output terminal of theGOA unit 210 of the previous row (that is, the (n−1)th row) to receivethe gate scan signal G(n−1) as the input signal (and the input controlsignal), and a second electrode connected to the first node PU, so as tocharge the first node PU when the fourth transistor T4 is turned on, sothat the voltage of the first node PU can turn on the first transistorT1, thereby enabling the clock signal CLK to be output through theoutput terminal. The storage capacitor C1 has an terminal connected tothe gate electrode of the first transistor T1 (that is, the first nodePU), and another terminal connected to the second electrode of the firsttransistor T1, so as to store the voltage of the first node PU and tofurther pull up, when the first transistor T1 is turned on to outputsignals, the voltage of the first node PU by its own bootstrap effect toimprove an output performance

When the GOA circuit composed of the cascaded GOA units 210 shown inFIG. 2 operates, in a case where the gate scan signal G(n−1) is at ahigh level, the fourth transistor T4 is turned on and charges the firstnode PU. The rising level of the first node PU causes the firsttransistor T1 to be turned on, so the clock signal CLK can be output atthe output terminal through the first transistor T1, that is, the gatescan signal Gn is equal to the clock signal CLK. When the clock signalCLK is at a high level, the gate scan signal Gn also outputs a highlevel. When the gate scan signal Gn is at a high level, the GOA unit 210of the GOA circuit inputs the high-level signal Gn to the gate line GLof a corresponding row, so that gate electrodes of the thin filmtransistors in all the pixel units corresponding to the row of gate lineGL are applied with the signal to turn on those thin film transistors.The data signal is input to the liquid crystal capacitor of thecorresponding pixel unit through the thin film transistor in each pixel,so as to charge the liquid crystal capacitor in the corresponding pixelunit, thereby implementing writing and holding of the signal voltage ofthe pixel unit. When the gate scan signal G(n+1) is at a high level, thesecond transistor T2 and the third transistor T3 are turned on, toachieve the effects of resetting the first node PU and pulling down theoutput terminal. Therefore, through the GOA circuit, for example, aprogressive scan driving function can be realized.

Since the source and drain electrodes of each of the above-mentionedtransistors are symmetrical with respect to each other, the source anddrain electrodes thereof can be interchanged. The first electrode maybe, for example, a source electrode or a drain electrode, and the secondelectrode may be, for example, a drain electrode or a source electrode.In the present disclosure, the source and drain electrodes of a thinfilm transistor are collectively referred to as “source/drainelectrode.” For example, each of the above transistors may be an N-typetransistor. Certainly, the above transistors are not limited to N-typetransistors, and it is possible that at least a part of the abovetransistors are P-type transistors. Therefore, the polarities of thecorresponding turn-on signal and the output scan signal may be changedaccordingly.

It should be noted that, in the embodiments of the present disclosure,the structure of the GOA unit 210 of the GOA circuit is not limited tothe structure described above. The GOA unit 210 of the GOA circuit mayadopt any applicable structure, and may also include more or lesstransistors and/or capacitors, for example, sub-circuits forimplementing functions such as first node control, noise reduction,etc., which is not limited in the embodiments of the present disclosure.

FIG. 3 is a schematic circuit structure diagram of an exemplary GOAcircuit. As shown in FIG. 3, the GOA circuit 200 includes a plurality ofcascaded GOA units 10. For example, the GOA unit 10 may be the GOA unit210 described above. The GOA circuit 200 can be directly integrated onan array substrate of a display device by using the same process as athin film transistor, for example, to realize a progressive scan drivingfunction.

For example, as shown in FIG. 3, except the GOA unit of the first stage,each of the input terminals INPUT of the GOA units of other stages isconnected to the first output terminal OUTPUT of the GOA unit of theprevious stage; and except the GOA unit of the last stage, each of thereset terminals RESET of the GOA units of other stages is connected tothe first output terminal OUTPUT of the GOA unit of the next stage. Forexample, the input terminal INPUT of the GOA unit of the first stage maybe configured to receive a trigger signal STV, and the reset terminalRESET of the GOA unit of the last stage may be configured to receive areset signal RST.

For example, as shown in FIG. 3, the GOA unit of each stage isconfigured to output a corresponding scan driving signal in response tothe clock signal CLK. The clock signal CLK may include different clocksignals CLK1 and CLK2, for example.

For example, as shown in FIG. 3, the GOA circuit 200 may further includea timing controller 220. The timing controller 220 is configured toprovide clock signals CLK to the GOA units of various stages, and thetiming controller 220 may also be configured to provide a trigger signalSTV and a reset signal RST.

It should be noted that the embodiments of the present disclosureinclude but are not limited to the scenario shown in FIG. 3. The timingcontroller 220 may also be configured to provide four different clocksignals to the GOA units at all stages through four clock signal lines,which is not limited in the embodiments of the present disclosure.

It should be noted that, in the embodiment of the present disclosure, ifa GOA unit B is a GOA unit of a next stage with respect to another GOAunit A, the gate scan signal output by the GOA unit B is later in timingthan the gate scan signal output by the GOA unit A. Correspondingly, ifa GOA unit B is a GOA unit of the previous stage with respect to anotherGOA unit A, the gate scan signal output by the GOA unit B is earlier intiming than the gate scan signal output by GOA unit A.

However, it should be understood that the GOA unit shown in FIG. 2 andthe GOA circuit shown in FIG. 3 are merely exemplary, and theembodiments of the present disclosure are not limited thereto. Thedriving method provided by the embodiment of the present disclosure canbe applied to various forms of GOA circuits.

In the driving method provided by the embodiments of the presentdisclosure, the clock signal frequency of the GOA circuit is reduced ina case where the data signals of one frame of image satisfy thefrequency reduction condition. Since the clock signal is usually outputby the IC in the display panel, the driving method provided by theexample can reduce the frequency of the IC outputting clock signals,thereby extending the life of the IC.

In some embodiments, the driving method may further include: maintainingthe refresh frequency of the GOA circuit unchanged if the data signalsof one frame of image satisfy the frequency reduction condition.However, it should be understood that, in other embodiments, in a casewhere the data signals of one frame of image satisfy the frequencyreduction condition, while reducing the clock signal frequency of theGOA circuit to 1/M of the original clock signal frequency, the refreshfrequency of the GOA circuit can also be reduced, which is not limitedin the embodiments of the present disclosure. In the following,description will be made with reference to the example in which in acase where the data signals of one frame of image satisfy the frequencyreduction condition, the refresh frequency of the GOA circuit unchangedis maintained unchanged.

In view of the above, it is known to those skilled in the art that thereis usually a time period from when the gate line is turned off to whenthe data signal is inverted. Since the gate line of the previous rowcannot be turned off instantly, the control signal requires a timeperiod to fall down, and the turning on of the gate line of the next rowalso requires a time period. However, if the turning on of the next lineis faster than the turning off of the previous line, it will cause afaulty operation, which will charge data signals of the next row to theprevious row. In order to prevent incorrect charging during this timeperiod, GOE time is usually provided in driving the GOA circuit, wherethe GOE time refers to a time period starting from the falling edge ofthe gate driving signal of the current row to the rising edge of thedata driving signal of the next row. The driving method provided by theembodiment of the present disclosure reduces the clock signal frequencyof the GOA circuit in a case where the data signals of one frame ofimage satisfy the frequency reduction condition, so the charging time ofeach row of pixels can be increased, while more sufficient GOE time canbe reserved, thereby avoiding the occurrence of many charging-relateddefects.

The driving method provided by the embodiments of the present disclosurewill be described in detail in combination with specific embodimentsbelow. For example, in a case where the data signals of one frame ofimage satisfy the condition that the data signals of the first halfframe of image are the same as the data signals of the second half frameof image, the refresh frequency of the GOA circuit is controlled toremain unchanged, and the frequency of the clock signal of the GOAcircuit is controlled to be reduced to ½ of the frequency of theoriginal clock signal. For example, when the same picture (such as agrayscale picture, FLK, HLine) is displayed on the upper and lower halfscreens of the display panel, the GOA circuit can be driven with thedriving method provided in the embodiment of the present disclosure.Here, FLK and HLine display alternating black and white lines. At thistime, it can be considered that the data signals of the first half frameof image and the second half frame of image in one frame of image arethe same.

Specifically, it is assumed that the refresh frequency of the GOAcircuit (assuming N cascaded GOA units) is 1/60 Hz, and the frequency ofthe original clock signal is ¼ Hz. FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram of acomparison of scanning directions of a grate line respectively in a casewhere a frequency reduction condition is satisfied and in a normaldriving case.

According to FIG. 4, when being driven normally, the GOA circuitsequentially scans the gate lines from the 1st row to the Nth row; andwhen the frequency reduction condition is satisfied, it switches to thedriving method provided in the embodiment of the present disclosure (forexample, when it is detected that the frequency reduction condition issatisfied, the switching is performed automatically, but it should beunderstood that the switching can also be performed manually, which isnot limited in the embodiments of the present disclosure). Specifically,the refresh frequency of the control GOA circuit is maintainedunchanged, and the frequency of the control clock signal is reduced to ½of the original clock signal frequency, that is, the new clock signalfrequency is ⅛ Hz. At this time, as shown in FIG. 5, when the startsignal STV of the first frame of image arrives, the gate lines in thedisplay panel are turned on sequentially starting from the first row.Since the clock signal frequency is reduced by half, when the gate lineof the (N/2)th row is turned on, the start signal STV of the secondframe of image arrives. At this time, the first-stage GOA unit is turnedon again. Since the GOA units of the various stages in the GOA circuitare cascaded, after the gate line of the (N/2)th row is turned on, thegate line of the ((N/2)+1) th row is turned on immediately after thegate line of the (N/2)th row. In this way, as shown in FIG. 4, the upperand lower half screens of the display panel are similarly divided intotwo independent small screens, and each small screen is sequentiallyrefreshed from top to bottom.

In this case, compared with other driving methods, on one hand, theclock signal frequency of the GOA circuit of the driving method providedin this embodiment is reduced to 1/M of the original clock signalfrequency, and the refresh frequency is not changed, so that thehigh-level duration of the clock signal (that is, the turning onduration of the gate line of each row) can be longer, and thecorresponding pixel charging time is longer. Therefore, the abovedriving method can reserve enough GOE time to avoid the occurrence ofdefects related to insufficient charging. On the other hand, since theclock signal frequency is reduced, the frequency of the clock signalsoutput by the IC can be reduced, thereby extending the life of the IC.

It should be noted that the above-mentioned operation of reducing theclock signal frequency of the GOA circuit is implemented only in a casewhere the data signals of one frame of image satisfy the frequencyreduction condition. For example, M=2, that is, in a case where datasignals in the first half frame of image and the second half frame ofimage are the same, the voltages on the data lines of the upper halfscreen and of the lower half screen do not change, so even if the gatelines of the upper and lower half screens are turned on at the sametime, no phenomenon of chaos image will occur.

In view of the above, after the display of one frame of image iscompleted, if it is detected that the data signals of the next frame ofimage do not satisfy the above frequency reduction condition,optionally, the driving method provided by the embodiments of thepresent disclosure further includes maintaining the refresh frequency ofthe GOA circuit unchanged, and controlling the clock signal frequency ofthe GOA circuit as the original clock signal frequency. That is, in acase where the frequency reduction condition is not satisfied, forexample, in a case where the next frame of image is a color image to bedisplayed, it will be switched back to the normal driving sequence,thereby improving the practicability of the driving method provided bythe embodiment of the present disclosure. In some embodiments,maintaining the refresh frequency of the GOA circuit unchanged may bemaking the refresh frequency of the GOA circuit be a preset refreshfrequency of the GOA circuit.

In addition, for high-load images such as HLine and 1dot, specifically,for such kind of screens, on the same data line, the gray levelsdisplayed by pixels in adjacent rows above and below are not the same,thereby resulting in that data signals require being inverted andchanged in each line. The load of the IC that outputs the data signalsis large. When applying the driving method provided in the embodimentsof the present disclosure to drive the GOA circuit, the display panelcan be divided into M parts and data signals are input to each part atthe same time. Since M≥2, the frequency of the data signals is reducedto at least ½ of the original frequency, which can reduce the load ofthe output module in the IC.

In view of the above, it is known to those skilled in the art that, asshown in FIG. 1, the normal driving sequence of the GOA circuit includesblank time BLANK, that is, after the display of one frame of imagefinishes, there is certain blank time before the next frame of image isstarted. Taking the above M=2 as an example, during the blank timeBLANK, no gate line is turned on in the display panel, so black stripsare likely to appear in the middle of the screen, which affects thedisplay effect.

To solve this problem, optionally, the driving method provided in theembodiments of the present disclosure further includes: as shown in FIG.5, controlling a blank time (Blank) between adjacent frames of images to0. In this case, taking the above M=2 as an example, since the drivingmethod controls the blank time (Blank) between adjacent frames of imagesto be 0, when the signal of the first frame of image is scanned to thelast row of grate lines, the start signal STV of the next frame of imagearrives, thereby avoiding the phenomenon of black strips betweenadjacent frame of images.

In addition, it should be noted that the display panel can be divided toeven smaller parts according to the characteristics of the data signalswhen the IC driving capability and the performance of the GOA circuitallow. For example, the above M can also be 4 or 8, and so on. In thiscase, the frequency of the IC outputting clock signal may be furtherreduced, which is beneficial to further extending the life of the IC.

At least one embodiment of the present disclosure also provides adriving method for a GOA circuit, including: providing data signals of afirst frame of image, and reducing a clock signal frequency of the GOAcircuit to a 1/M of an original clock signal frequency, wherein the datasignals of the first frame of image can be equally divided into M partsin time sequence, and the data signals of each of the parts are thesame, where M is an integer and M≥2.

In some embodiments, the driving method may further include: maintaininga refresh frequency of the GOA circuit unchanged. However, it should beunderstood that in other embodiments, in a case where the data signalsof the first frame of image satisfy the frequency reduction condition,it is also possible to reduce the refresh frequency of the GOA circuit,while reducing the clock signal frequency of the GOA circuit to 1/M ofthe original clock signal frequency, which is not limited in theembodiments of the present disclosure.

In some embodiments, M may be any real number greater than or equal to2, such as 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, etc., according to actualrequirements.

In some embodiments, the driving method may further include: controllingblank time between adjacent frames of images to be 0. This can avoid thephenomenon of black strips between adjacent frames of images.

In some embodiments, the driving method may further include: providingdata signals of a second frame of image, and maintaining the refreshfrequency of the GOA circuit unchanged and controlling the clock signalfrequency of the GOA circuit to an original clock signal frequency,wherein the data signals of the second frame of image cannot be equallydivided into M parts in time sequence. For example, when the next frameof image is a color image, it is switched back to the normal drivingsequence, thereby improving the practicability of the driving methodprovided by the embodiment of the present disclosure.

At least one embodiment of the present disclosure also provides adriving device for a GOA circuit. As shown in FIG. 6, the driving device600 includes a control sub-circuit 610, which is configured to in a casewhere data signals of one frame of image satisfy a frequency reductioncondition, reduce a clock signal frequency of the GOA circuit to 1/M ofan original clock signal frequency, wherein the frequency reductioncondition includes that: data signals of one frame of image is capableof being equally divided into M parts in time sequence, and the datasignals of each of the parts are the same, where M is an integer andM≥2.

The driving device provided by the embodiment of the present disclosurecan reduce the clock signal frequency of the GOA circuit in a case wherethe data signals of one frame of image satisfy the frequency reductioncondition. Since the clock signals are usually output by the IC in thedisplay panel, the frequency of the IC outputting the clock signal canbe reduced, thereby extending the life of the IC. At the same time, thecharging time of each row of pixels can be increased, and moresufficient GOE time can be reserved, thereby avoiding the occurrence ofmany charging-related defects.

In addition, for high-load images such as HLine and 1dot, when applyingthe driving method provided by the embodiment of the present disclosureto drive the GOA circuit, the display panel can be divided into M partsand data signals can be input to each part at the same time. Since M≥2,the inversion frequency of the data signals is reduced to at least ½ ofthe original frequency, thereby reducing the load of the output modulein the IC.

In some embodiments, the above-mentioned control sub-circuit 610 may befurther configured to maintain the refresh frequency of the GOA circuitunchanged in a case where the data signals of one frame of image satisfythe frequency reduction condition. However, it should be understoodthat, in other embodiments, the above-mentioned control sub-circuit 610may be further configured to: in a case where the data signals of oneframe of image satisfy the frequency reduction condition, reduce therefresh frequency of the GOA circuit while reducing the clock signalfrequency of the GOA circuit to 1/M of the original clock signalfrequency, which is not limited in the embodiments of the presentdisclosure. In the following, description will be made with reference tothe example in which when the data signals of one frame of image satisfythe frequency reduction condition, the refresh frequency of the GOAcircuit is maintained unchanged.

In view of the above, optionally, the control sub-circuit 610 may alsobe configured to maintain the refresh frequency of the GOA circuitunchanged in a case where the data signals of one frame of image do notsatisfy the frequency reduction condition, and control the clock signalfrequency of the GOA circuit to be the original clock signal frequency.In some exemplary embodiments, the above-mentioned control sub-circuit610 may be implemented as a frequency converter or a frequencyconversion circuit formed by discrete components, and the like, whichare not limited in the embodiments of the present disclosure.

Further, the driving device provided in the embodiments of the presentdisclosure may further include a determining sub-circuit 620 in signalconnection with the control sub-circuit 610, and the determiningsub-circuit 620 may be configured to determine whether data signals ofone frame of image satisfy the frequency reduction condition, and outputthe determination result to the control sub-circuit 620. At this time,the control sub-circuit 620 can operate according to the abovedetermination result. Signals between the control sub-circuit 610 andthe determining sub-circuit 620 can be transmitted through a wiredconnection, a wireless connection, or the like. For example, signals canbe transmitted through a wire connection, a Bluetooth connection, aWi-Fi connection, a cellular network connection, a local area networkconnection, an Internet connection, etc., which is not limited in theembodiments of the present disclosure.

Optionally, the control sub-circuit 610 may also be configured tocontrol blank time between adjacent frames of images to be 0. In thiscase, when the display panel is displayed, it can prevent black stripsfrom appearing between adjacent frames of images, thereby improving thedisplay effect of the display panel.

For example, taking M=2 as an example, in a case where the data signalsof one frame of image satisfy the condition that the data signals of thefirst half frame of image are the same as the data signals of the secondhalf frame of image, the control sub-circuit 610 is configured tocontrol the refresh frequency of the GOA circuit to remain unchanged,and control the frequency of the clock signal of the GOA circuit to bereduced to ½ of the frequency of the original clock signal.Specifically, as shown in FIG. 5, when the start signal STV of the firstframe of image arrives, the gate lines in the display panel are turnedon sequentially starting from the first row. Since the clock signalfrequency is reduced by half, when the gate line of the (N/2)th row isturned on, the start signal STV of the second frame of image arrives. Atthis time, the first-stage GOA unit is turned on again. Since the GOAunits of the various stages in the GOA circuit are cascaded, after thegate line of the (N/2)th row is turned on, the gate line of the((N/2)+1)th row is turned on immediately after the gate line of the(N/2)th row. In this way, as shown in FIG. 4, the upper and lower halfscreens of the display panel are similarly divided into two independentsmall screens, and each small screen is sequentially refreshed from topto bottom.

In some exemplary embodiments, the determining sub-circuit 620 may alsobe implemented in software, hardware, firmware, or combinations thereof.For example, the determining sub-circuit 620 may be implemented as acomparator or a comparison circuit formed by dicrete components, or thedetermining sub-circuit 620 may also be implemented manually by manuallypressing a button or the like, which is not limited in the embodimentsof the present disclosure.

In this case, compared with other driving methods, the GOA circuit isdriven by the driving device provided by the embodiments of the presentdisclosure, on one hand, the clock signal frequency of the GOA circuitis reduced to 1/M of the original clock signal frequency while therefresh frequency is not changed. In this way, the high-level durationof the clock signal (that is, the turning on duration of the gate lineof each row) can be longer, and the corresponding pixel charging time islonger. Therefore, applying the above driving device can reserve enoughGOE time to avoid the occurrence of defects related to insufficientcharging. On the other hand, since the clock signal frequency isreduced, the frequency of the clock signals output by the IC can bereduced, thereby extending the life of the IC.

It should be noted that the driving method and driving device of the GOAcircuit according to the embodiments of the present disclosure may beimplemented in software, hardware, firmware, or combinations thereof.For example, in the driving device 600 in the embodiment of the presentdisclosure, the control sub-circuit 610 and the determining sub-circuit620 may be separately provided processors, or may be implemented bybeing integrated in a certain processor of the display panel, or may beimplemented in a form of program codes stored in the memory of thedisplay panel, and is called and executed by a processor of the displaypanel. The processor described herein may be a central processing unit(CPU), a graphics processor (Graphics Processing Unit, GPU) or aspecific integrated circuit (Application Specific Integrated Circuit,ASIC), or an integrated circuit configured to implement the embodimentsof the present disclosure.

At least one embodiment of the present disclosure also provides adisplay device including any driving device as described above. As shownin FIG. 7, the display device 700 includes a driving device 710 for aGOA circuit, and the driving device 710 for the GOA circuit may be anyone of the above driving devices. It should be noted that the displaydevice 700 in this embodiment may be: a liquid crystal panel, a liquidcrystal television, a display, an OLED panel, an OLED television, anelectronic paper, a mobile phone, a tablet computer, a notebookcomputer, a digital photo frame, a navigator and any product orcomponent with a displaying function. The display device 700 may furtherinclude other conventional components such as a display panel, which isnot limited in the embodiments of the present disclosure.

What are described above is related to the illustrative embodiments ofthe disclosure only and not limitative to the scope of the disclosure;the scopes of the disclosure are defined by the accompanying claims.

What is claimed is:
 1. A driving method for a gate driver on array (GOA)circuit, the driving method comprising: reducing a clock signalfrequency of the GOA circuit to 1/M of an original clock signalfrequency, in a case where data signals of one frame of image satisfy afrequency reduction condition, wherein the frequency reduction conditioncomprises that the data signals of the one frame of image is capable ofbeing equally divided into M parts in time sequence, data signals ofeach of the M parts are the same, and M is an integer and M≥2, whereinthe reducing the clock signal frequency of the GOA circuit to 1/M of theoriginal clock signal frequency, in the case where the data signals ofthe one frame of image satisfy the frequency reduction condition,comprises: reducing the clock signal frequency of the GOA circuit to to½ of the original clock signal frequency, in a case where the datasignals of the one frame of image satisfy a condition that data signalsof a first half frame of image are the same as data signals of a secondhalf frame of image.
 2. The driving method according to claim 1, furthercomprising: maintaining a refresh frequency of the GOA circuit unchangedin a case where the data signals of the one frame of image satisfy thefrequency reduction condition.
 3. The driving method according to claim2, further comprising: controlling blank time between adjacent frames ofimages to be zero.
 4. The driving method according to claim 1, furthercomprising: maintaining a refresh frequency of the GOA circuit unchangedand controlling the clock signal frequency of the GOA circuit to be theoriginal clock signal frequency, in a case where the data signals of theone frame of image do not satisfy the frequency reduction condition. 5.The driving method according to claim 1, further comprising: controllingblank time between adjacent frames of images to be zero.
 6. A drivingdevice for a gate driver on array (GOA) circuit, the driving devicecomprising a control sub-circuit configured to reduce a clock signalfrequency of the GOA circuit to 1/M of an original clock signalfrequency in a case where data signals of one frame of image satisfy afrequency reduction condition, wherein the frequency reduction conditioncomprises that the data signals of the one frame of image is capable ofbeing equally divided into M parts in time sequence, data signals ofeach of the M parts are the same, and M is an integer and M≤2, whereinthe control sub-circuit is further configured to: reduce the clocksignal frequency of the GOA circuit to to ½ of the original clock signalfrequency, in a case where the data signals of the one frame of imagesatisfy a condition that data signals of a first half frame of image arethe same as data signals of a second half frame of image.
 7. The drivingdevice according to claim 6, wherein the control sub-circuit is furtherconfigured to maintain a refresh frequency of the GOA circuit unchangedin a case where the data signals of the one frame of image satisfy thefrequency reduction condition.
 8. The driving device according to claim6, wherein the control sub-circuit is further configured to, in a casewhere the data signals of the one frame of image do not satisfy thefrequency reduction condition, maintain the refresh frequency of the GOAcircuit unchanged and control the clock signal frequency of the GOAcircuit to be the original clock signal frequency.
 9. The driving deviceaccording to claim 6, wherein the control sub-circuit is furtherconfigured to control blank time between adjacent frames of images to bezero.
 10. The driving device according to claim 6, further comprising adetermining sub-circuit in signal connection with the controlsub-circuit signal, wherein the determining sub-circuit is configured todetermine whether the data signals of the one frame of image satisfy thefrequency reduction condition and output a determination result to thecontrol sub-circuit.
 11. A display device, comprising the driving devicefor the GOA circuit according to claim
 6. 12. A driving method for agate driver on array (GOA) circuit, comprising: providing data signalsof a first frame of image, and reducing a clock signal frequency of theGOA circuit to 1/M of an original clock signal frequency, wherein datasignals of the first frame of image is capable of being equally dividedinto M parts in time sequence, data signals of each of the M parts arethe same, and M is an integer and M≥2, wherein the reducing the clocksignal frequency of the GOA circuit to 1/M of the original clock signalfrequency comprises: reducing the clock signal frequency of the GOAcircuit to to ½ of the original clock signal frequency, in a case wherethe data signals of the first frame of image satisfy a condition thatdata signals of a first half frame of image are the same as data signalsof a second half frame of image.
 13. The driving method according toclaim 12, further comprising: maintaining a refresh frequency of the GOAcircuit unchanged.
 14. The driving method according to claim 12, furthercomprising: providing data signals of a second frame of image, andmaintaining the refresh frequency of the GOA circuit unchanged andcontrolling the clock signal frequency of the GOA circuit to be theoriginal clock signal frequency, wherein the data signals of the secondframe of image is not capable of being equally divided into M parts intime sequence.
 15. The driving method according to claim 12, whereinM=2.
 16. The driving method according to claim 12, further comprising:controlling blank time between adjacent frames of images to be zero.